Barry Norman
| Barry Norman | |
|---|---|
| Born | Barry Leslie Norman 21 August 1933 London, England |
| Occupation | Film critic, media personality, novelist |
| Nationality | British |
| Period | 1960–2001 |
| Genre | Television |
Barry Leslie Norman, CBE (born 21 August 1933 in London) is a British film critic, writer and media personality. He is best known for presenting Film… on BBC One from 1972 to 1998, the programme's longest-running host.
Barry Norman is the son of film director Leslie and Elizabeth Norman. He was educated at a state primary school and at Highgate School, then an all-boys independent school in north London. He did not go to university, but instead began his career in journalism at the Kensington News, later spending a period in South Africa where he developed a hostility to the situation created there by the emergence of apartheid. He is the brother of script editor and director Valerie Norman.
By the 1960s, Norman was a prominent journalist, and show business editor of the Daily Mail until 1971, when he was made redundant. Subsequently, he wrote a column each Wednesday for The Guardian, also contributing leader columns to the newspaper.
He was one of the collaborators with Wally Fawkes on the long running cartoon strip Flook. He has also contributed a column to the Radio Times for many years, and has written several novels.
He presented BBC1's Film programme from 1972, becoming the sole presenter the following year. Norman's involvement was broken in 1982 by a brief spell presenting Omnibus. After having returned to the Film series in 1983, Norman became increasingly irritated by the BBC's reluctance to screen the programme at a regular time, and in 1998 he finally accepted an offer to work for BSkyB, where he remained for three years.Jonathan Ross took his place as the BBC programme's presenter.
...
Wikipedia